The Economic Times recaps the best workplaces for 2011. Your one stop destination for the companies that cared for its employees and vice-versa.

The Economic Times and Great Place to Work Institute joined hands to find out the best workplaces. More than 500 companies signed up for this year's survey, of which 471 met the strict eligibility criteria.

A total of 67,000 employees across 20 sectors went on to participate. The results give a first-hand feel of workplace culture from an employee perspective. For India Inc., the last year has been good but not great. Muted growth has generally kept salary hikes and bonuses at relatively low levels, especially when compared to the pre-slowdown boom years. This actually makes for a more stable environment, where attrition is low and organizations have time to put in place practices that serve them well in the future.

People today want independence, empowerment and creativity in their lives and companies need to create such enabling environments. CEOs need to be closely involved in the process of building talent pipelines and creating a culture of meritocracy, learning and trust. In the final analysis, being a great place to work makes business sense. Check out the company on the top of our list. It's Google.

A good place to work is no accident but Googlers are allowed to slip now and then. It is part of the 'Googliness' that all employees must have in their DNA. A lump of risk appetite, more than a dash of innovative spirit, a fistful of adaptability and loads of affability make for this heady concoction. A note of caution—even a pinch of bureaucracy would ruin it.

"Failure is encouraged here," software engineer Deepak Raghuwanshi says. He recounted that learnings from misses in product development to bad canteen food are taken up with equal amount of participation. "It feels like working in a start-up where there are no boundaries and the mission is to have one Google moment a day," says Rajan Anandan, VP, India Sales & Operations.

The recruitment process ensures that a new joinee, or 'Noogler', is brought into the folds of the company right from day zero.

They have their desk ready along with a cubicle warming party thrown just for them the day they join.

The bottom-up approach is made clear to such Nooglers who are encouraged to ask questions and told that they have no specific KRAs or managers breathing down their neck.

The dominant gene that runs through Intel is to prove founder Gordon Moore's code right every time. 'The number of transistors incorporated in a chip will approximately double every 24 months' was his tenet and at the company, it's followed to the 'T' allowing it to steer ahead of the competition. But that never deterred Intellites from enrolling in the cooking class or making their own vegetable patch in office.

At every stage, there are focus group discussions. For managers, there is 'Anubhava', a programme where they share their 'Best Known Methods' every quarter. Then there is CAIR (Careers At Intel Realised), where employees are provided with resources, tools and support to work on areas they are passionate about. Some, for instance, are seen solving math problems on online tutorials for their colleagues' children.

The New Orientation Programme and 'Arambh' bring in the new employees to Intel with all the paraphernalia intact, including setting up their workstations. All managers are made to interact with the newcomers who get to know their company and its brass on the very first day. Questions that can be answered by the best in the field crop up the day speed mentoring is in session. One of the more popular practices, this lets employees ask the best in the field on the work done in the product and career space.

Ownership is what people get when they jump ship to embark on a voyage on makemytrip.com. At the 11-year-old online travel portal, the top management never loses sight of an opportunity to toss up the ownership card to its employees. When the company listed on Nasdaq last year, there were 150 'Trippers' with stock options, about 20% of the 700-odd workforce then.

"But as soon as appraisals are over in a month, we intend to cover about 70% of the workforce with ESOPs," says Founder-CEO Deep Kalra. Again, when KRAs are set every February, the business plan for the company is outlined bottom-up.

So a line of business heads come up with revenue projections for the subsequent year, which is then given to finance for compilation and vetting. "This ensures a lot of ownership of KRAs," points out Rohit Hasteer, Head of HR at the Rs 274.50-crore travel node.